Cloudy Twilight
by Basilisk Zero
Summary: Is a world without seru really necessary? My first multichapter fanfic story, you've been warned. Rated for safety.
1. Chapter 1

I don't write much, let alone fanfiction, and it'll probably be painfully obvious why from this. That said, if I'm harrassed about it then I may actually finish it...

On this I assumed the machines beneath Ratayu are organic, they look like it anyway.

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Chapter 1- Monsters in the Basement

Darkness, held together with yellow walls broken by bloody veins. There were voices outside that wall, and light as well, not much, perhaps, but it was there. She had seen it long ago, back when she could still hear the voice of the great one, before most of the lesser voices went dead and His followed a short eternity later.

This was after she had been dropped back into the darkness, the fetid, blood-warm, senseless darkness. After being given the first intoxicating taste of fresh air and seeing that there was something else outside the prison, something the voices had only hinted at. She still cried for that loss the only way she could; with screams that made the opaque yellow membrane shudder and the little voices, those that were left, cry with her.

There were almost no voices left now, even the clipped murmurs from outside the wall had ceased long ago. She stared at the wall, at the tiny things moving in it. There didn't used to be things in it; she would have noticed, and so would those other creatures with clipped voices. They hadn't liked the little things, they'd killed them every time they had begun to appear. She wasn't sure she liked them either, they crawled over her and made her itch and she could do nothing about it…

Could she?

She shifted her tail, remembering how it had felt when they had locked her back into the darkness; the hopelessness and fear. She had moved then, and after too, but not for a long time since. Her tail twitched, it felt heavy and awkward, but it moved. She tried her claws next and was amazed when they too twitched in response to her vague order.

She suddenly became aware of the many thousands of things crawling across her skin and over her eyes in a way she had never before. Almost against her will she shuddered massively and a coat of little things dropped off and skittered away. There were still more so she did it again, more controlled, the instinctive shake of a dog ridding water from its coat. The rotted wall tore from the stress of a ton of scale and muscle and she slid down the slick, rotting sphere onto a solid stone floor thick with mold and larva.

There was no light; it was nothing like she remembered. Tattered bits of flesh thick with crawling things hung everywhere, falling with wet sounding plops at intervals to add to the heaving mass on the floor. Rising despite her weakness out of sheer revulsion, she slithered and slid over the pale, writhing bodies to a place that looked cleaner.

A path of rotting sludge less deep then the surrounding stuff led to somewhere opposite the direction she had faced that time long ago. After resting her shaking muscles for awhile she moved on, feeling cooler air in the direction the path led, eventually reaching a small opening that blazed with light. After blinking for several minutes, unable to tear her watering eyes from the sight, she began to notice details in the stone the silver light shone on. Moving closer, she saw deep, whirling designs on the dark marble that led her eyes upward towards the opening itself, though she had another fit of blinking before she could look directly at the silver-ish white orb glowing above.

Moon… She felt she had always known what it was from the dream images of the lesser voices, but the reality of the softly blazing… thing… It defied all description. She didn't know how long she stared at it, but she noticed when it began to disappear behind the walls of the tunnel!

Feeling as though she'd just been shocked awake, she flung herself at the tiny opening and tried to squeeze her emaciated, though still considerable bulk through it. Failing that, she brought her oversized claws into play and ripped at the hard stone, desperate not to be left in that darkness again. Heedless of the pain of her breaking claws and the rocks and dust falling into her almost blind eyes, she dug up through the rock to catch another glimpse of the moon. She dragged herself upward until she could push herself out of the widened hole, where she froze.

Colors, not bloody yellow or red, not rotting gray-green, not the coppery brown of dry blood. As far as she could see the ground was a bright, clean green with blurry gray and dark blue in the distance. A sweet smell came from that grass, and a vaguely salty scent tainted the air. Turning, she saw stones rising high above her head and heard the distant mutter of human voices from behind that wall. A quick shudder and she turned back northeast, towards the blue-ness in the distance. She was free, but they would not like that, she was sure.

Although overwhelmed by the senses overload, one thing pushed to the forefront of her mind; a gnawing ache in her belly, getting stronger as she scented the pristine air. Hunger…

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That was the easy part, writing humans is much more difficult...


	2. Chapter 2

Now for a human chapter, yay...

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Chapter 2- An unplanned vacation

"Come on! We never get to go anywhere interesting!" The speaker was in his mid-teens, though his tone could easily have belonged to someone significantly younger when he whined like that. Vahn sighed, when he was that age he'd already embarked on the journey to revive the Genesis Trees. His mind immediately shied away from that line of thought, but he couldn't help glancing at his right arm.

"It's not interesting, it's just a research center. You need to stay here and continue your studies; maybe we'll go to Sol this summer if your grades keep up." Vahn turned to continue packing, the discussion over in his opinion. Derem, however, made no move to leave.

"You know I'll pass, I always get good grades! I'll study extra on the trip and ask the teacher to give me the work for the next two weeks! Pleeeeeeease?" Derem watched his adopted uncle for any sign he was wearing down, but Vahn acted oblivious to his begging and continued to stuff useful items into his pack. Derem took as deep a breath as he could fit into his lungs, and tried again, knowing he'd have to get some reaction at least.

"PLEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEASE!?" Vahn slammed the healing leaf he'd been holding into the desk, leaving a dark smear on the wood. "No, you're not coming. In fact, you're grounded to the village until I get back." He pointed to the door, a clear order. Derem glared, trying to look angry and sulky, but the idea that uncle Vahn thought he could ground him was so ridiculous he had to hold back a grin. He wouldn't even be in the village to suspect a thing! He walked out into the sunlight and turned towards the blue-haired girl who was sitting beneath a tree waiting for him.

She stood up and started to walk towards him. "Well?" Derem shook his head no and glanced at the memory cave to indicate they'd talk there.

A minute later they were inside the cool cave. Littlekids often played here, but school was still in for another hour or so and it was far too hot to walk to one of their usual hang-outs. "He said no, I told you that he'd have listened to you better, he's _your_ dad!" Derem sat near the glass-like memory statue, kicking it absently with his foot. Then he grinned at her "He grounded me! I don't know how he expected that to work when he can't keep me grounded even when he _is_ here though."

Merae sighed. "So I guess we won't be able to go, maybe I _should_ have tried it instead of you. Though he doesn't listen to me either…"

Derem shook his head. "He doesn't listen to anyone; he always has to be in charge." They sat in silence for a little while, thinking of possible solutions. "We could try jumping into the door of wind again." Merae suggested dully. They'd tried that last time, it hadn't worked well at all.

Derem's eyes narrowed, forgetting for a moment that Merae was watching him. He wasn't staying in this village, how dare they tell him what to do all the time!? He was a man, he'd prove it if they'd just stop babying him. Some emotion rose up inside him, it was almost like fear. What if he really was stuck here in the middle of nowhere forever? What if he never got to see the places his mom and uncles talked about? What if he never got to see one of the few seru that were left in the world or…?

He kicked the Memory Statue again, striking it as hard as he could as if that would break his doubts. Merae gave him one of her looks, but was used to his tantrums and said nothing. A moment later he was calm again and grinned sheepishly. "Yeah, we can try jumping in again and deal with the consequences later. Merae nodded, there wasn't any better plan. "So, my place ten minutes before they leave?" He thought about that for a moment. "Yeah, maybe it'll work this time. I'm gonna go, I'll try making myself useful to mum and see if that works." They left, each to try different begging strategies.

Reaching his house, Derem entered and yelled that he was home. No answer, mum must've gone out to get something, he thought to himself. He wandered over to the cabinet, deciding to make dinner. This wasn't entirely to get mum into a better mood, the fact of the matter was that Noa was an _awful_ cook. Bringing some vegetables to the table, he noticed a note written in what was unmistakably his mothers' chicken scratch. Derem stared at the paper on the kitchen table in disbelief, knowing what it said without reading it. Finally, he forced his eyes to focus on it and decipher the nearly illegible writing.

_Derem _

_ive gone with your unkles to Ushas reserch senter and ill be bak in a cupal days. i wanted to say bie but vahn said youd try to come with us again and that its dangerus to jump into a door of wind wen its bing used. Ill bring you back sumthing good. Be good, i love you! Heart_

In a separate corner of his mind, Derem congraduated himself on deciphering the scrawl, but most of his attention was on the fact that he'd been abandoned without so much as a goodbye. There was a knock on the door that jarred him from his thoughts, and then Merae let herself in looking as angry as he'd ever seen her.

"Let's go." Her voice was oddly flat, as were her eyes. She marched over, grabbed him by his arm, and started out the door. Since the choice was to follow or get dragged, and Merae was more than a little threatening in this sort of mood, Derem quickened his pace.

"Where?" She turned to glare at him as if the question was too idiotic to answer. It probably was...

"Where do you think?" He dug his feet in as he realized what she was planning. "We need food and water and packs and all that!" There was no stopping Merae now though, she tightened her grip painfully and started dragging him along behind her.

"OKAY!" Derem rubbed his wrist but followed her obediently. "We can get that stuff from the hunters spring. Right now we have to get out of town before we get caught." She flicked her eyes towards the school for emphasis; a teacher was standing by the door to make sure all the littlekids left the area and stared at them suspiciously.

They slowed down and began complaining about what a pain it was to have to do so many errands, loudly. It was a well practiced routine and they kept it up until they reached the gate, now much farther from the beach then it had been 16 years ago to hold the growing town.

Derem was nervous, a lot of things could go wrong, but Merae's confidence kept it from seeming too impossible. Besides, it'd be another cold day in underground Octam before he'd admit to being scared of a little adventure. He looked at the gatekeeper sheepishly, as if this were another trip to Drake castle for Drake water or other such item that he'd prefer to just avoid. They got many such chores, as if wandering around Drake Castle could make up for the fact that they'd never once left the south side of the river.

The man smiled back and gave them a quick lecture not to get complacent on the road, even for so short a trip, and then they were out. It was shockingly easy and they kept expecting to be stopped at any second.

Though they had been outside the town countless times, it somehow was different this time, everything looked sharper and he felt sort of giddy. The two of them exchanged glances and tried not to grin, heading down the well traveled road towards the hunters spring without looking back once.

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As you can see, there's going to be a lot of OC's in this because of how few interesting characters are in LoL. (Don't kill or maim me for that...) Any tips on how to keep Merae from becoming a Mary Lou would be deeply appreciated, I'm very inexperienced at this. I'll write another chapter once someone reviews or in 9 months when I get the urge to try and finish it. It's up to you which comes first. :P


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